Carnival at Why Homeschool

The latest Carnival of Homeschooling: The Memorial Day edition is happening at Why Homeschool! Please stop by and take a look at the many articles submitted this week!

Home Spun comic strip #619

Setting up timelines based on my kids' interests proved a bigger challenge than I thought! Believe it or not, I tried to keep this as simple as possible by only covering the major eras. Yu-Gi-Oh is sideways and highlighted because although it is an era, it came toward the end of the Dinosaur era. Any similarity to the interests of other homeschooled children is purely coincidental.

Monday is Not the First Day of Summer

Every year it mystifies me that the last Monday in May is seen as a day of happy celebration, the arrival of Summer, and a wonderful opportunity for bargain hunters who like to take advantage of sales.

I want to be perfectly clear and honest here. I'm a peace activist. If I can do something toward the goal of ending war, I will. I value and respect all life. That means I also value and respect the sacrifice made by men and women of the armed forces. Men like my late father-in-law Lew, who served during WWII. To me, today is a somber day of remembrance, set aside to honor those who gave their lives in the service of our country and the veterans who have passed away. Today I honor the lives of these brave men and women and I pray that those who still stand in war zones remain safe and get to return home soon.

The day is Memorial Day. It is a day when we should honor those who have spoiled us with the freedoms we so often take for granted. Take a moment from the activities of your long weekend to talk about them. Remember them.

Home Spun comic strip #618

Interesting Article from an Old Friend

If you commented on my blog and I haven't returned comments in a while, I apologize. The last two months have been quite a wild ride of busy, with very few stops to stretch my legs, wave hello, go to the bathhroom, etc. In fact, I only recently caught up with the blog of a special friend of mine. She is special because she is the one who first turned my mind onto homeschooling and inspired me to start the grand adventure I have been on for fourteen years now. She moved away from the area, so I haven't seen her in years. She no longer homeschools, but she does still teach. In catching up on her blog, I found a wonderful article I wanted to share. It makes me think that there are many of us who come to homeschooling as a natural response to how we ourselves were raised. Some of us had parents that looked at education when we were kids and wanted to find innovative ways to make learning happen. Parents like my friend's Dad. You can read about his ideas in Buzz and My Dad.

Home Spun comic strip #617

Description and pictures of a carnotaurus can be found at the Free Dictionary. Chase first heard about them from the movie Dinosaur, which came out in the midst of his dinosaur craze, but we didn't see it until it was available on video from our library. It was probably one of the last dinosaur movies he saw before his interests took him in other directions.

Our son's interests were so distinct, I could categorize them as eras: the Thomas the Tank Engine era, the Dinosaur epoch, the Dragon period, the age of Yu-Gi-Oh, the computer game era. The Dragon period was more of an arc bridging dinosaurs and Yu-Gi, and happened to coincide with our studies of the Middle Ages. Don't you love it when that happens?

Home Spun comic strip #616

When my son first discovered Yu-Gi-Oh, it was as a cartoon. Once he discovered it was a card game, he desperately wanted to play...as Yu-Gi. Which left his father to play the villains. Of course, his dad thought they were playing a game. A very complicated game at that, where every card had its own rules. Needless to say, those early games didn't go well. My son would get upset when he lost. He was also known to "shuffle" the deck so that the right cards would end up in his hand. This was a real problem. A sore loser is one thing, a cheater is quite another. It took a while to realize that what was happening was Chase's own method of pretending. The cartoon was all about the main character playing in competitions, and Chase was mimicking these matches.

The Yu-Gi-Oh decks don't come out as much as they used to, and in spite of my fears, my son did not become a card shark with the self control of John McEnroe. I am not saying it was easy to guide him through an extremely competitive stage, but having the insight that part of the joy he had for the game was role-playing rather than card playing certainly helped us over a major hurdle.

Home Spun comic strip #615

Today is Chase's birthday. I have successfully navigated May Birthday Madness. Today my little boy is fifteen. It's interesting entering this month knowing that all of my children will change their ages by the end. They are now eighteen, fifteen and nine. How time passes! I'm so glad I have been able to watch them grow and learn. I wouldn't trade my experience for an extra paycheck, a clean house or even a less hectic schedule. We are living life the way we choose--and having lots of fun along the way.

Sad Cat

Hobgoblin had an ear infection. His ear blew up like a balloon. I took him to the vet earlier this month and he ended up in surgery to drain his ear. Since then I have had to give him pills and ear drops. Ever give a pill to a cat? Lots of fun. Drops can be worse, since we often lose our grip and he shakes like an out of control sprinkler. Ten days of daily medicine and now give him pills every other day. Ten more days of ear drops. It's very hard to look at this face with one flopped ear knowing I will have to force his mouth open and push a pill down his throat. Especially when that face is ringed with a plastic cone collar. He is our sad little conehead.

Stitches come out next week. In the meantime, we try to give him lots of love to make up for the medicine. The happy side effect of his experience is that he has been much more cuddly. When we are hurting, we can all use a good hug.

Home Spun comic strip #614

Home Spun comic strip #613

I realized I have never discussed birthdays in my comic strip. This is a dreadful oversight, considering birthdays use up a good chunk of May in our house. May birthdays make life particularly challenging as a homeschooling family. When we classically homeschooled, I struggled to finish up for the year by April, because I knew it would be too hard to teach them with the constant distractions of baking, family, and parties. Not only that, they managed to find friends who are also in May. I think we could fill most of the days of May with birthdays. Anyone else have a birthday month?

Another Day in May, Another Cake

Today's cake request was for the Cheshire Cat. Marina is now twice Sierra's age and old enough to vote. One more cake to go!

Birdhouse for Wren

When we moved into our house over ten years ago, one of the first things I did in the spring was to set up a birdhouse. I got it up rather late in the season, so I didn't have much hope anyone would move in, but that April a house wren took it over and made it his own. He put a lot of work into it. Our reward was seeing the wren and his mate raise their young that summer.

We've gone through several birdhouses since that first year in our home. Some years the wren would use it, some years he would simply fill it with nesting material but raise his young somewhere else. It's a peculiarity of the house wren. They tend to hog the birdhouses, even throwing nesting material over other birds eggs. They like to set up several nests to impress a mate, then she chooses which one will be used.

This year, a chickadee tried to take the birdhouse. I was excited to see someone different nesting. Chickadees are around all winter, so technically he had first dibs on the new house I had set up in the autumn.

That did not sit well with the house wren. Now it is likely that this is not the original wren, but it might be a descendant of the one who first nested with us. I should look up what their life expectancy is. At any rate, I'm sure our young oak tree has been in their family for generations, and the wren wanted to keep it that way. When he returned in April, his song filled our bedroom, but he wasn't singing for pleasure. He was mad. We watched for days as he hectored the chickadee. Keep in mind, the chickadee is slightly larger than the house wren. The chickadee would fly out of the birdhouse and attack him, but the wren simply continued his rant. I felt sorry for him, so I tried to calm them by hanging extra houses, but they meant nothing to my ornery little friend. Location, location, location. That oak tree had been his, and he was not going to give it up without a fight. Or two.

Just when we thought the chickadee had settled in, Sierra spotted the wren flying in and out of the house, singing his heart out. We aren't sure how he had managed to take it over, but now there was no sign of the chickadee. The wren sent him packing.

Which leads to another life lesson from watching animals....

Sometimes you have to fight for what is yours, even if it's not.

A Heart Full of Memories

Once upon a time, when my mom was young, she was given a beautiful pendant as a gift. It was a clear Lucite heart with tiny rose embedded in it. She loved this pendant, and it stayed with her through her life. Mom cherished this pendant and the story behind it. (I won't relate the story here, as I don't want to mess up the details.) She had planned to give it to her first granddaughter.

My mom likes to walk, she takes walks every day, and she loved to wear her pendant. One day she had trouble with the clasp and the pendant fell off during her walk. She had lost this cherished possession. When she called to tell me, she was so very sad. Weeks went by, but she never found it.

Now I believe that our love for our things is tied to the memories they stir. While the memory is within us, it is perfectly understandable that we sometimes want a physical reminder. It tells us where we come from, attaches us to our past and helps us carry our history into the future. So when I thought about what I might give mom for Mothers' Day, I thought about her lost heart. I decided to give her back her memory. I tried to find something similar, but I couldn't. So instead, I watched a few videos online, bought some supplies, and set to work to create this resin heart...


It isn't exactly the same as the lost pendant, but I hope it will help keep the memory alive. And maybe add a few new ones. Marina added the chain with a very secure clasp.

It's the first time I've ever made a resin pendant. Isn't it amazing what you can learn to do on your own?

The Art Show

There was a student art exhibit at the college last week. It was an impressive display. There is a lot of talent on the campus. It also gave me many creative ideas that I am trying to file away in my head for future reference. Marina had three works in the show. On the left, she is standing next to her self portrait. Below, she is standing near one of her still life sketches.


Below is an ink drawing she did of shoes. Sorry these are so small. I forgot my camera and used my cell phone camera. My father's cell took the photos above.

I'm amazed at the work she's produced in her sketching class. I've never given her a lot of formal training in art, preferring my parents method. They let me explore my art talents on my own until I chose to go to an art centered high school. This was her first actual art class with a teacher that explained techniques. She really enjoyed this class, and that joy shines through in her drawing.

I think she's found her niche. I am in awe of her work.

Home Spun comic strip #612

I'm going to take a much needed break this weekend, so I may not have new comics up next week. I want to rest up before the next wave of birthday baking! I hope all of the mothers reading this--new, old, and honorary--have a wonderful Mother's Day weekend!

Home Spun comic strip #611

Ever get those blank stares when you try to be witty or flippant or simply try to make a point? As my son has entered his teenage years, the blank stare is punctuated by eyes that seem to roll up and disappear into his eyelids. I'm so much funnier in my head.

Cake 1 and Cake 2

Birthday season has started in our family. Because Easter was so late, it seemed to begin rather suddenly. My father and Sierra have birthdays four days apart, with my father's birthday starting festivities only days after Easter. After Mothers' Day I will be baking for Marina and Chase's birthdays, which are five days apart. We eat a lot of cake in May. So far I have baked two cakes. I'll share them here.

First we have Buelo's cake. I hadn't done a carrot cake in a while. I don't why, I love carrot cake! I combined directions from a good recipe I have and suggestions from an episode of Alton Brown's Good Eats. He suggests peeling the carrots rather than grating. Carrot cakes I've made where I grated the carrots tended to be very mushy. As long as you don't mind the occasional carrot string, peeling works out much better.







Today's cake will be shared by Sierra and her friends. She asked for a cat theme, so of course I tried something new, rather than simply make another cat cake, as I did for Marina one year. Here we have my attempt at a cup cat cake. Now in my defense, I didn't have enough time to make a cake today, since Marina has classes all day and Chase has a class in the afternoon. Therefore, I wanted to use a frosting that would keep in the cake carrier overnight. I really would have preferred chocolate whipped cream, but I ended up using a fudge frosting. This was not my best idea, since I thought they meant fudge tasting, not actual fudge consistency. This is why the cats look like they've been playing in mud. Oh well. Another year, another cake decorating lesson learned. Next year I will make sure I have all the necessary ingredients on hand for a simple buttercream frosting. Stick with what you know, save the experiments for the off-birthday season!

Carnival at Home School Dad

The latest Carnival of Homeschooling: Top 10 Film edition is now open at Home School Dad! Dave has put together a wonderful carnival using his top ten favorite films. See if you can find some of your favorite films on his list and enjoy this week's articles from homeschooling bloggers around the internet! (I'm looking forward to reading Rapunzel, Unschooler myself!)

Home Spun comic strip #610

It's important to me that my children learn to be somewhat self-sufficient. I'm happy to report that they are all able to at least cook breakfast, cut and prepare vegetables, and put their clothes away (most of the time.) Marina has become quite the baker, Chase can make pancakes for breakfast (from scratch, not a mix), Sierra can scramble eggs and all three can handle side dishes for dinner.

I admit I'm not inclined to give up the laundry to their care. I have trust issues when it comes to the care of my clothes. I figure the first time I cause a pink wash or shrink a sweater my teenagers will insist on doing their own wash....just like I did.